Sports of The Times; Scrapbooks Of History For the U.S.

By GEORGE VECSEY

Published: June 26, 1998

NANTES, France—
SAY goodbye to the 1998 American World Cup team. It was to soccer what American cheese is to food -- bland, formless and ultimately harmless.

The team disappeared into history last night with a 1-0 loss to Yugoslavia, which is no shame, considering that Yugoslavia has the firepower of a semifinalist. However, the Americans had already identified themselves as mushy in previous losses to Germany and Iran.

The team will always be remembered as having very little in common with the American team that qualified from a grueling two-year tournament in the Americas. That team was dismantled by the coach, Steve Sampson, in recent weeks, starting with the still-unexplained sacking of John Harkes, the doughty captain.

Sampson's reward for such last-minute tinkering will surely be his freedom to seek new challenges in the wonderful world of work. The officials of the United States Soccer Federation called a press conference in the wee small hours of this morning to insist that Sampson has indeed not been dismissed, but that a decision will be made within 30 days.

Sampson's departure will come too late for the cadre of veterans who held the team together for much of this decade, but were discarded in recent months. As the team went to a rural retreat in Beaujolais country, the players began whining about being isolated, far from the bright lights of downtown Lyons.

In recent days, Alexi Lalas made several grumpy remarks about the demise of the team. To combat the mutterings, Alan Rothenberg, the president of the federation, addressed the players yesterday. He said there was no threat involved: ''I just told them to think about what you say. Don't say anything you might regret.''

Since this tournament is being held in the land of liberte, egalite, fraternite, a few of the lads felt they had the freedom to say a few words after the game.

''We'll all get older, and we'll all have scrapbooks,'' said Lalas, normally flippant but apparently furious. ''I'm satisfied with myself, even though I didn't play a minute here. I'll be satisfied with my scrapbook. Steve has to be satisfied with his scrapbook.''

Sampson may not want to put into his scrapbook the epitaph from Tab Ramos, the crabby little midfielder who was a star in the 1990 and 1994 World Cups but only a bit player here.

''For one reason or another, this whole thing was a shambles,'' said Ramos, who noted that 17 different players saw action in the first two games, and ''everybody felt he should play.''

One of those was Eric Wynalda, the United States' all-time leading scorer, who was brought in late last night, and was not a factor.

Of course, it is hard for strikers to function in Sampson's 3-6-1 formation, which leaves one forward as isolated as the frontier scout played by Kevin Costner in the movie ''Dances With Wolves.''

Wynalda said he thought Sampson's decisions were ''personal,'' not necessarily connected to soccer, but he did not elaborate.

Once the players had trudged off into history, Rothenberg and his associates talked up the future of United States soccer. Sunil Gulati, the vice president of the federation, who deals with the players, noted that the United States used to have a pool of 20 players but now has 100 good players available.

Rothenberg noted that the United States had played three losses in 1990, and achieved a second-round loss to Brazil in 1994. He insisted this year's three-and-out performance was in some ways an improvement. He must have been watching Nigeria or Mexico. The United States team basically could not pass or shoot. To their credit, however, the lads did qualify for France, which allowed hundreds of Americans to wander around this lovely Loire Estuary town, happily eating crustaceans and wearing their Sam's Army T-shirts.

Now some of the lads take a brief vacation before their European clubs start again, while others will be playing for their Major League Soccer teams as soon as tomorrow night. The federation goes looking for a coach. Carlos Queiroz, the experienced Portuguese coach, has committed himself to coach the United Arab Emirates. Carlos Alberto Parreira, who won the 1994 World Cup with Brazil, has just been dismissed by Saudi Arabia. Rothenberg leaves office on Aug. 23, but promises a coaching decision by then.

In the meantime, there are more crustaceans in Nantes, and 16 good soccer teams starting tomorrow. Oddly enough, without the Yanks, the world keeps spinning.